Early in 1945, whilst on a visit to the
second-hand department of Heffers in Cambridge, I found a copy of Volume
IV of War in the Air. I paid my 7s.6d. and took it home to study. At
that time there were no enthusiast journals dealing, even partially,
with the First World War in the Air, Popular Flying and Flying
having ceased publication in 1939, so I was bowled over by the amount of
information. It turned out that although publication of the various
volumes had spanned the years 1922 to 1937 they were still available.
Some stock of The War in the Air was stored ‘flat’, i.e. in
sheets but if I ‘could wait a week or two’ they would be bound
specially for me. The £5 odd for the rest of the set was nearly a
week’s pay for a Flying Officer but I took a deep breath and placed my
order. I have never regretted it.
What I had got was six main volumes, an appendix
volume and two boxes of maps. The main volumes totalled nearly 3,000
pages and well over a million words. They are organised more or less
chronologically, the Western Front 1914 being in Volume I and the
Western Front 1918 being in Volume VI. Some subjects are grouped: e.g.,
if you want East Africa you need Volume III, if you want Home Defence
you need Volumes II and V. The main narrative is interspersed with
dissertations on Training, Supply, Organisation etc. Throughout there
are excellent good-size fold-out maps, many in colour, plus Orders of
Battle.
Who to write this opus was a problem. The decision
to produce a Royal Air Force History was taken in May 1918 and the
selection of Sir Walter Raleigh, Professor of English Literature at
Oxford was made in June. The Air Council had considered a number of
names before deciding on Raleigh, one of whom was Erskine Childers. Sir
Walter’s appointment started in July 1918 at a salary of £800 per
annum. The History was planned to comprise three volumes and take
several years.
Raleigh tackled the task with enthusiasm
travelling widely to collect material. It was when doing this in Arabia
that he contacted typhoid fever and died not long after returning to
England.
Various names were suggested to take over the work
including Major General Ernest Swinton, Maurice Baring, John Masefield
and John Buchan. The final choice was Dr D.G. Hogarth, wartime director
of the Arab Bureau in Cairo and Keeper of the Ashmolean Museum. The
History did not progress well and in 1924 Hogarth resigned to return to
Oxford.
Again an author was sought. Trenchard wanted a
writer of brilliance but Hankey and the Committee of Imperial Defence
wanted a technical history. This time T.E. Lawrence was approached but
he declined the honour. Eventually, from a short list of three, H.A.
Jones was chosen, his appointment dating from February 1925. Jones had
served in the Air Historical Section of the Air Ministry from November
1918 until transferring to the Department of Trade 1923.
Trenchard’s biographer described the writing of
Jones as ‘painstaking fact dressed in the dullest of prose’. The
reader must judge for himself the value of that comment but the
advantage which Jones had was experience of events themselves. He had
served in the Royal Flying Corps and Royal Air Force as an Observer with
47 Squadron and had a hard-earned Military Cross. The volumes by Jones
also have indexes plus first-class maps, which Raleigh had presumably
thought unnecessary. Progress was now steady, Volume II appearing in
1928, moving to Volume VI in 1937.
Some years ago Naval and Military Press reprinted
some of the volumes in hardback at about £45 each. Now they have
reprinted them all in paperback at £18 each or £126 for the set.
Although the books vary from 200 to 400 pages the price is constant.
What do you get for your money? These are
facsimile reprints, that is to say that Volume II page 201 is identical
to the Volume II page 201 original. The paper quality is good and the
greeny-blue covers are attractive. Because they were hardback the
originals seem larger but this is solely the difference between hard and
limp covers, the page size being identical. Basically the binding is
glue but Naval and Military assure me that it is strong enough to
withstand maltreatment. The maps embedded in the text are smaller than
the originals and have no colour.
In 1922 Edward Arnold published a small book (not
part of this set) by H.A. Jones entitled Sir Walter Raleigh and the
Air History. It is an affectionate look at Raleigh’s way of
working and a glimpse at his methods of research. The language is of
another age: Raleigh thinks ‘Brancker is as gay as a lark’.
Nevertheless for your £126 you get all the
million words, a lot of which are by eyewitnesses and a lot of which are
not available at Kew. Whether you think it’s worth the money depends
on your point of view: consider the cost of a pair of trainers, or a
restaurant meal for a family party. No contest!
